Getting Events onto CaughtUpFeature Proposal

The following is an email to the CaughtUp Team suggesting a feature on how to get events on CaughtUp. Previously, we were considering using an API from an event company to get events on the app that users can discover. But, in this email I shared where events I care about come from and how they are shared.

Check out the blog post for the release notes of the app version 0.14.0: App Release Notes v0.14.0 as we’ve already implemented this feature.

Hello Team,

What are your thoughts on the direction to implement this instead of adding an Events API to get events? I think we could also join AI Hype 😁.

Scheduling, Discovering, Sharing. On the subject of making it easier to discover events, I think we should get events from people. I don’t think we should use an API to get events from event platforms such as EventBrite. It may be bloatware.

We want it to be easy for people to find events. Events that are relevant.

WHY?

I was thinking about what kind of hangout people go to and how they find them. Event Brite and other event management platforms only have big events that are paid. People find events from flyers they see while walking or visiting a store or gym, or they see it on Instagram.

Sure they may find an event URL online. But most events and hangouts people go to are not on any one platform. The number of events I go to with Event Brite in a month? 0. It’s maybe once a year.

The number of times I see a flyer or hear about an event on Instagram, or an email? Plenty more. It could be a picture, a description, etc.

In college what kind of meetup events are around? They aren’t on EventBrite. They’re in emails, flyers, Instagram.

FEATURE PROPOSAL

I propose we make it easier to translate those events into CaughtUp.

With advancements in AI OMG we can do this and it can be very accurate.

The formula is simple:

Given a photo -> extract all text via AI (easy)

Event text -> make it into an event. Using the new AI models.

With the created event in the app, we can add more value by just prompt the user to invite people easily & manage who’s going and the follow up chats and all things required for an event.

If the user makes the event public, then we could add that to the event discovery feed we wanted to make.

PROTOTYPE

We’ve already made a prototype in the past. This was done over a weekend. So, we should be able to get this working fairly quickly.

Image of flyer → text → event details parsed → Google calendar event was what this project did.

• Our Virginia Tech Hackathon Project on DevPost
• The concept is here: 2020 02 16 04 54 43 VT Hacks 7 | Flyer Event Parser
• The code is here on GitHub (currently private)

DEMO

Also, I tested just extracting text from a screen capture of an event on Instagram. (I also think its a cool benefit to add the image of the event flyer right on the CaughtUp calendar event)

Then I extracted all the text (including the description in the unrelated post) using vision AI (what’s found on phones / Google Lens).

Gave the text to a GPT AI (Bing chat, but others are available and integrate well with what we have) and asked it to tell me when the event is happening.

It works really well!

Image I captured from Instagram feed.

Raw text extracted with prompt for ai:

“given the text extracted from a screen capture which may or may not have additional irrelevant data, parse the event details into the starting, end time, title, and note section: Mosaic! Indulge in complimentary… more View all 4 comments October 12, 2023 innovate_vt INNOVATE Join us for complimentary SUNDAY BRUNCH Sunday, Oct 1st 10:30 to 12:00 CID Lawn Parents Welcome! Liked by ****** and others innovate_vt Join us this Sunday at the CID lawn for Innovate’s delightful autumn family brunch, happening from 10:30 to 12:00! Delicious food awaits, so… More”

Results

We have implemented this feature

We have implemented this feature in the CaughtUp app. You can now add events by taking a picture of a flyer or an image of an event. The app will auto-parse the event details — no manual typing required! 🧙‍♂️

Check out the blog post for the release notes of the app version 0.14.0: App Release Notes v0.14.0

Originally published at https://www.caughtup.app.